October 16, 2014

Sample of a male threat, described by authorities as “typical”, that Sarkeesian receives.

After weeks of silence, the mainstream media is finally reporting on the deluge of violent threats made by men towards feminist media and pop culture commenter Anita Sarkeesian, which caused her to flee her home on advice of the FBI, and cancel a scheduled university appearance.

While it is good that the violent male campaign against Sarkeesian is finally, belatedly, receiving widespread attention, any feminist who has ever written or spoke in public on the subject of “Gender” will note that what is unusual is not the threats themselves, but the fact that they are being reported by male-stream media.

The New Statesman posts a piece today by GlossWitch, in the shadow of the Sarkeesian fiasco, which specifically addresses the ongoing campaign of censorship against the Women’s Rights movement by the male Transgender Rights movement, whose goals are in opposition.

October 7, 2014

McCallum

Wealthy transgender Twitter executive Dana McCallum evaded prosecution on multiple felony counts of rape, false imprisonment, and battery, even though there were multiple witnesses to his violent rape spree, which he inflicted on his estranged wife in the presence of their children.

“At a hearing in San Francisco Superior Court this morning, Dana McCallum, a Twitter engineer and prominent women’s rights and LGBT activist, accepted a guilty plea for two misdemeanors related to the alleged rape of her wife. McCallum, who is a transgender woman, was initially charged with five felonies for the alleged incident, which occurred in January.

The misdemeanors were for one count of domestic violence with corporal injury to the spouse (California penal code 273.5) and one count of false imprisonment (code 236). McCallum, whose legal name is Dana Contreras will serve three years probation, 4 days in county jail (with credit for the 4 days already served), 25 hours of community service, counseling for substance abuse, 52 weeks of domestic violence counseling, as well as some minor fees.

In court today, McCallum first said “no contest” to the plea, but the District Attorney’s office insisted on a guilty plea.

McCallum initially pled not guilty to the felony charges, which included three counts of spousal rape, one count of false imprisonment and one count of domestic violence.

McCallum and her wife are in the process of getting divorced. The victim told Valleywag that McCallum served her with divorce papers two days before the incident. However, the victim also noted that the incident occurred when McCallum arrived uninvited and unexpected at the victim’s house in Noe Valley. The victim’s three children and her daughter’s friend were present that night. McCallum’s former attorney John Runfola, who has been replaced with Nanci L. Clarence, said that McCallum served her wife with divorce papers one day before the incident. The divorce has not been finalized.

McCallum’s wife read a a moving victim’s impact statement before the judge today where she said McCallum was given two opportunities to apologize, but did not apologize or ask about her welfare. She described the incident as an “alcohol fueled sexual violent crime, but said she wanted “forgiveness” to prevail and for this to be “an inspiration for other addicts,” rather than “an ugly headline for the vultures to pick over.” She said that she still loved McCallum and was disappointed by the community’s response:

I must say that it deeply saddens me that as a victim, my only public support has been from hate groups. I expected more from the LGBT and feminist community. It’s a shame that they can’t do the emotional work it requires to process that someone they love is capable of such an awful crime. That is their burden to carry, though.

McCallum has been working as an engineer at Twitter since 2010. She was arrested in January and released on $350,000 bail. According to an earlier report from the San Francisco Examiner, court documents stipulated that McCallum had to attend AA meetings as a condition of her release. The Examiner also obtained a copy of a criminal protective order, which stated that McCallum must not contact or come within 150 feet of her wife.

The victim told Valleywag that they had been separated for eight months. In April, the San Francisco Chronicle said:

McCallum, whose legal name is Dana Contreras, had been separated from her wife for about a year but maintained a polite, and at times sexual, relationship with her, authorities said.

The case has been deeply troubling for equal rights advocates in the technology industry both because of the nature of the charges and because McCallum, who is best know by the handle @DanaDanger, has long been an activist for feminist and LGBT causes. Last January, she wrote a piece about women and transgender people for Model View Culture. The article has since been deleted, along with McCallum’s bio, which used to say:

Dana McCallum has been working in software engineering and engineering leadership since 2000. As an advocate for women in technology and the LGBT community, Dana helped create advocacy teams at Twitter and other companies, served as a delegate on women’s issues in India, and speaks regularly at events focused on women and LGBT people in tech.

McCallum has also tweeted a number of times in support of justice for rape victims.

In April, McCallum’s old lawyer, John Runfola, aggressively denied the allegations, telling the Examiner that the victim was after a monetary gain. Twitter went public in November, 2013. The lockup period, after which Twitter employees could sell their stock, ended in May. However, unless otherwise agreed upon California divorce law states that assets like stock options are community property and divided equally. The couple has been married since 2007, before McCallum’s tenure at Twitter. What’s more, if McCallum had been convicted of felonies, it could affect her job at Twitter and therefore spousal support.”

June 25, 2014

Village Voice staff writer Tessa Stuart ran a piece yesterday on the topic of ‘Gender Hurts’, featuring an exclusive interview with the author. What follows is the entire published interview, reprinted without authorization under Fair Use. Enjoy! Read the rest of this entry »

June 14, 2014

From the Ancient Roman forum to Twitter, women have long had to fight for freedom of speech. In 2014, women are still fighting for this basic human right. Online abuse directed at women crosses all forums of the internet. Few women writers and campaigners have not had their views or arguments mocked online at some point. More worryingly, women online also regularly face abuse, harassment, intimidation and violent threats. The purpose of this abuse is to silence women and remove them from public debate.

Sadly, I am not immune to abuse, harassment or threats online (hint: I’m female). Because over the past several months I have talked about gender and biological sex, I have got all kinds of crap from trans activists and…

“[Managing Director of Books Jeremy North of Routledge Press] suggested we could review the book after it was published. And now I’m doing just that. Or, rather, I expect I will, if ever I can bring myself to read it. What follows is not a thorough review, but an impression based on a lookover of Gender Hurts.

Interestingly, the page count of Jeffreys’ book is almost the same as Raymond’s; at 189 pages it weighs in just four pages longer than Raymond’s 185.”

Aah, yes, the page count. And what of the paper quality? How much does the book weigh? Does it have that “new book smell”? What was the cost of the shipping freight?

Dallas Denny

Angry men should never feel obliged to read a woman’s words before forming strong opinions about them, and subsequently publishing those very important opinions. All that female-impersonator Denny needs to do is look at the book cover to conclude that Jeffreys “adopts a lesbian uniform that makes her look more than a bit like a man. She’s about four shots of testosterone away from passing as one.” How can men possibly take the time to read the books they are reviewing when the author is lesbian, and fails to adopt a distinctly sexay laydee wardrobe requirement?

Read more of Denny’s devastatingly insightful review of a book he has not read here:

Today’s second review is by another man, who in this case claims to have actually read the book he is reviewing. In a New Statesman piece Tim R. Johnston generously offers that feminists have the right to critique males but “that critique must come from a place of established respect.” Jeffreys has dismally failed to respect men in her feminist text, says Johnston. LOL!

“The entire text is a striking example of how not to criticise a group [men] of which you are not a member.” Insensitive, man-hating feminist dyke! In one succinct sentence Mr. Johnston places Jeffreys’ text into the entire canon of the history of the Women’s Liberation movement, on which he claims to be an authority: “The book is poorly researched and argued, and is not a meaningful contribution to feminist theory.” Oh, Okay bro.

“Mansfeminist” Tim R. Johnston

Johnston suggests that women abandon women’s liberation and release ourselves from our “attachment to our sex”; By doing so (Stupid cunts! Why haven’t we thought of this ourselves!) we will..something… something …something.

“When we abandon our attachment to either sex or gender identity we can more clearly see the experiences we share and let those experiences form the basis of a coalition.” Okay bro.

The important thing is that men who take pleasure in sex-roles should be prioritized over the actual violence and subjugation of women.

“Trans women [men] may identify as women, but they are not women because they do not have the lived history of having been born and raised as women. Identity cannot replace or change your history of living as one of two biological sexes. Feminists have good reason to be attached to this foundation. Women are violently persecuted because of their sex, and the methods of that persecution, methods like rape and forced reproduction, often involve female anatomy. Uniting in this shared history is an important foundation for feminist consciousness raising and solidarity.

Many [male] people ground their politics in gender identity, describing how this identity is a persistent aspect of their experience. Cisgender people [women] must realise that a [male] woman did not become a woman after transitioning, [he] has always been a woman, and because [he] is a woman [he] deserves access to women-only spaces. Certainly not all [male] people identify as having always been one gender, but focusing on gender identity over biological or assigned sex is an important way to ensure that [male] identities are not discredited, ignored, or marginalised.”

Jeffreys’ work, which is not meaningful to male feminism, discredits, ignores, and marginalizes male feelings and the access to women that males deserve. Oh gosh no!

June 4, 2014

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Ryders Eyewear
We’ve received some backlash regarding our recent ad in Bicycling Magazine–some people have wrongly concluded that Ryders is attacking transgender people.

This ad is not, in any way, an attack on transgender people. It’s simply showing two people who are attracted to one another, each with a secret that the other might want to know up front. The person on the left has a secret–he owns an abnormal quantity of cats. The person on the right has a secret–he is actually a man dressed as a woman. We were toying with some of the social constructs that have made gender roles appear as truths, in an attempt to bring some humour to the concept that seeing isn’t always believing.

********************EDIT***********************

It’s now been a full day since the first messages arrived in response to our ad in Bicycling and it’s clear that we have offended lots of people. It doesn’t matter what our intention was, the result was anything but humorous. This ad was clearly a failure.

We are sorry. We are sorry to those we have offended and we are sorry for spreading a hurtful message.

Thank you to everyone who messaged us. Without you we would have carried on with this advertisement, oblivious to the harm it was causing. We were ignorant and you have shown this to us.

We have pulled this ad from all of the publications in which it was to be printed in the coming weeks and months. Unfortunately, some have already been printed and distributed. Rest assured, this ad will never be distributed again.

We are also in the process of having it pulled from digital magazines and other web sites. For some sites, especially those of distributors outside of the US and Canada, this may take a few days before it’s entirely cleaned up but it is our top priority to completely remove this image.